Wednesday, October 22, 2008

I guess anybody can be a pornographer now....

I was rather amused to see that I've shown up on the radar of "feminist law professor" Ann Bartow. In a post about Wikipedia she writes:
To take just one example, the entry about Melissa Farley has been heavily edited by a pornographer who sometimes uses the pseudonym Iamcuriousblue. He also shows up numerous times in the edits to the Catharine MacKinnon entry and virtually every place feminism is mentioned. That any judge, or anyone generally, would think these accounts of feminism are unbiased or authoritative is truly scary.
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I'll take on the stuff about Wikipedia later on my own blog, since that's kind of peripheral to the subject here. (But I'll just say that I'd be happy to scrutinize my record of writing balanced entries and general adherence to the rules of Wikipedia, particularly compared to the past contributions of Nikki Craft, whom Bartow posits as being driven away by the evol anti-feminists who inhabit the Wikiverse.)

I think what is interesting, though, is that she calls me a "pornographer". Not that I find that an insult – I'm honored by the label, actually. However considering that I've never shot a single sexy photo, or a single minute of porn video, or even published or posted an erotic story in a public forum, I'm afraid I have to decline that title.

Then again, as we discussed in a recent entry or two, high-falutin feminist academics aren't always known for getting their facts straight.

14 comments:

  1. Neh, she just wants to discredit you before you even have the chance to defend yourself. It's amazing how they spit the word at people like it's some poisoned dart.

    Then again, to them it is.

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  2. Ann Bartow??? Would that be the one who tried to threaten to sue the former Bitchlab (now known as Shag over at Wear Clean Draws for making some disparaging remarks about Catherine MacKinnon??

    Yet she has the gall to call you a "pornographer"??? Just because you happen to disagree with her???

    Yeah, right. Talk to the middle finger, Ann.


    Anthony

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  3. Did Bartow threaten to sue BitchLab or out her real name? Or both? It was some utter bullshit move, in any event, not unlike Stormy or Julie Bindel. I believe Bartow also threatened to sue one of women at Feministe at one point. She's a complete asshole and somebody who's abusing her license to practice law.

    She might be getting "pornographer" from my Wikipedia page where I describe a tag up with the description "a hardcore member of WikiProject Pornography". In any event, I've certainly been called worse things than "pornographer". :)

    Oh, and its nice to see that B|L has a new blog – I'll definitely be checking it out.

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  4. i sent her an email pointing out her mistake

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  5. Oh, I see Bartow's latest comment:

    "It’s not just Farley he wiki-stalks, it’s also MacKinnon, Dworkin, Linda Boreman, Robert Jensen, Sheila Jeffreys, Robin Morgan, the Redstockings, Ellen Willis, Susie Bright, Betty Dodson, almost anything or any person related to feminism. Even the entry on “feminism”!"

    Let's see, there's an even mix of articles I've contributed a lot to, pages I've contributed one or two things to, and ones I've never touched. Not to mention an even mix of people who I don't think to highly of and ones I admire, but all of whom I'm accused of "stalking". Put down the crack pipe Ann!

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  6. IACB...I believe that it was both...Ann not only attempted to out B|L, but did hint at the notion of legal action, too.

    Oh...and doesn't Wikipedia have right of first refusal over alterations to their entries??


    Anthony

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  7. Oh, good Lord, IACB....you're stalking Linda Lovelace?!?!?! That would be a tremendous task, considering that she's been DEAD for about, I guess, five years??

    And I thought that "stalking" meant physically threatening people....how in the HELL would that apply to Redstockings or Susie Bright or Betty Dodson, whom I assume are on OUR side of the sex debate?? Does that mean that I'm stalking Nina or Ren??? Damn....I'm turning myself in to the police right away. ;-)


    Just goes to show you that even law professors with big degrees are capable of brain farts. Go. Away. Ann.


    Anthony

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  8. Oh, here's an old blog entry about Bartow's threats against Zuzu from Feministe. The poor lady actually stopped blogging for a month because of threats from Bartow.

    And for supreme irony, if you check out her teaching page over at USC, she teaches a course in "Individual Liberties". -- sound of head hitting desk --

    As for Wikipedia, no, actually, anybody can edit it, even anonymous contributors, but Wikipedia does have rules and guidelines (about neutrality, not contributing novel research and analysis, etc) that are enforced (albeit, often poorly) by the overall community. And I'll point out that the reason that Nikki Craft and Heart aren't contributing there anymore is not because there's a big anti-feminist cabal, but because they seriously flouted those rules, most notably by writing their own biographies, something very frowned upon in the Wikipedia community.

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  9. Yeah, actually about 90% of the articles on Ellen Willis and Redstockings are my writing, but I think you'd be hard-pressed to call those in any way feminist-bashing.

    And my contribution to the article on Linda Lovelace – mainly changing the section on "Books" from this to this. Yeah, such insanely biased material I'm putting out there to deceive the public – I don't know how I can live with myself.

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  10. IACB,

    Congratulations. Welcome to the patriarchal conspiracy to oppress women everywhere through pronification, even though some of those you're accused of doing this to are considered pornificatrixes themselves. I mean, how did Susie and Betty get on that list? They're Third Wave icons.

    And the thing about Linda Boreman? Creepy. Like you're trying to "revise" her story all these years after her death? She was frantically attempting to revise it herself at the end.

    Well, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Prof. Bartow had something to do with bringing TPoP to the U.S.C. campus at the end of this month. I was wondering why they'd bring it so close to unfriendly territory. Perhaps they feel they've got some local supporters to manipulate the viewing conditions.

    Anyway, if nobody's attacking you, you must be doing something wrong. Considering the source, I'd take it as compliment.

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  11. Thanks for that.

    Just to clarify about which USC Bartow is at, she's at University of South Carolina Law School, not the better known University of Southern California.

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  12. youre not a pornographer anymore, just a rabid pornography proponant.

    humans...

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  13. Marilyn Chambers lead role in Cronenberg's Rabid

    Hey IACB, I just featured this in my Halloween movie-trailer list! It was a great horror movie, and Chambers' well-known reputation gave the whole plot a real CHARGE that I don't think it would have otherwise had.

    Thanks for mentioning one of my favorites!

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